Blessed Are Those Who Live Out Their Dreams

4 years ago while I was cycling across the country I stumbled into a lot of random situations by chance but few as good as this one.

In Rapid City South Dakota I went to a float tank center, I didn’t have any place to stay so the owner let me crash in his garage, he was cool, his parents owned a shop growing up. He took me mountain biking in the black hills, and introduced me to some amazing Indian food. 

A week or so later I’m heading out of Deadwood, (a tiny little Wild West shoot out casino town that feels like a step back in time) when I stop at the last gas station before going over the pass on my way down into Spearfish Canyon. An arborist stops to admire my bike as I’m grabbing a last minute snack for the road, he mentions that he rides mountain bikes and has done a bit of bike packing himself. Turns out he lives in Spearfish and knew who I had stayed with in Rapid City, because they ride together. I didn’t have a place to stay lined up in town for the night so he said to me “worst case scenario you can crash in the hammock in the yard”. 

A mountain pass and a few scenic detours along in the canyon including a waterfall stop hike later, we’re having beers in his backyard, when I mention that I’m heading towards Devils Tower.  His Roomate an x-journalist turned pizza chef comments that she used to be the care taker at this private property inside the grounds of the monument that was grandfathered in because it was there before it was designated. She told me that he would let travelers crash on his property with an epic view of the tower from the campsite, she contacted him and told him to expect me. I take her up on the offer and head that direction across state lines putting South Dakota in the rear view mirror of Wyoming. 

I contact him to let him know I’m coming when I finally can see the tower from 20 miles out coming off the high plains down the ridge into the valley hitting nearly 60mph on the descent. When I received his response the directions were to “continue up the main road through the gate, past the monument and take the second left, then when the road forks go left, when it forks again go right and we’ll be on the porch at the end”.

I ride up and up and up and up and up into the dark and sure enough as promised that faint lone light in the distance surrounded by darkness in the moon shadow of the tower eventually led to a smiling face that was larger than life. He said, “you made it! Set your tent up anywhere you’d like to the right of the house, there’s an outhouse and an out door shower we’ll see ya in the morning for breakfast”. 

When I awake and unzip my rain fly I’m greeted with the most magnificent view of my life, the worlds first national monument, Devils Tower. The outdoor tower shower was worth all those weeks on the road you couldn’t put a price on that after pedaling all that way from Kentucky. When I go inside to the main house as soon as you crest the doorway you are met with this extravagant mural that reads “blessed are those who live out their dreams” and there’s Frank playing ragtime blues on the piano and sining for his many guest dining at his cartoonishly long dining room table. A center piece feature that accentuated the view of the tower though his massive greenhouse sized glass windows like a red carpet leading to the doorstep of one of mankind’s greatest wonders. 

At this point in time the reality of this was too good to be true, the man himself was as cartoonishly larger than life as his dining room table. Now I began to wonder if I was about to be indoctrinated into a cult when eventually I finally realized where I was. This was not some crazy cool dudes wild commune, this was a rock climbing resort that operated as a bed and breakfast that offered guided tours. It just so happened to be owned and run by the eccentric man who authored the original climbing guide to the mountain as well as all the updated editions. Did I mention he’s also in the gunnies book of world records for most ascents, and has CD’s of his original music for sale on the counter.

I had planned on taking a rest day there just to hike around the tower and soak it all in. I had no plan on climbing the tower when I arrived but as I’m sitting on the couch after breakfast looking over one of his books, one of the guest says “you should do it, I had no experience and I did it, if you could pedal all this way here I’m sure you could do it as well”. And I’m sitting there thinking, man if this guy could do it, I totally could do it. I meet some of the climbing guides who have moved here from all over this country & world for this summer job mainly because they absolutely love climbing and are naturally drawn to the magnetic pull of the tower, one had even hitchhiked his way there surviving on $5 a day.

After breakfast I ride down to the monument to get an up close and personal look at this towering rock, lock my bike up & begin my hike around the base, & scramble up into the bolder fields for some photos. Half way around this absolutely massive monsoon comes out of nowhere and completely soaks me like I went swimming with all my clothes on. I eventually make it back to the visitor center not before getting pelted with stinging pea sized hail, I try to wait out the rain before riding back when I eventually throw in the towel say fuck it and pedal back up to the lodge only to find that my tent stakes didn’t hold and the storm had lifted my tent across the property, my bags were under the fly but not inside the tent itself to weigh it down, learned that lesson the hard-way. I don’t make that mistake anymore the bags go inside the tent.

They let me hang out inside and dry my clothes and sleeping bag etc. I befriend the guides practicing in the indoor climbing gym on the property. A guide from another program out west in Joshua Tree was in town to teach the instructors there a training method for a new certification. They used me “a novice” as a dummy for some instructional training manuals, we all had a good time waiting for the storm to pass and once the skies had blown over we’re were all drinking n smokin n shootin guns and trading stories in the woods. I tried to offer tipping a few of the guys to take me up the tower on their day off but nobody was willing to. I laid down for bed that night thinking to myself what are the odds of me landing in this random place, I can’t not climb that thing. I thought oh well maybe next time…

The next day as I was packing up my stuff to ride out the guide from out west yelled “hey, you ready!? We’re goin up the tower… you’re the dummy for their training though, so, we’ll take you up there, but they’re gonna practice emergency survival and escape techniques on you” I thought to myself, never in a million years would I have ever dreamt my bicycle would led me to such a wild experience. I replied after a long pause “Hell Yeah”!

Gear check, pre climb talk, drive to base, hike to route, scramble through the bolder fields to the first pitch, harness up, leaders belay and set the lines, it’s my turn, im fucking terrified, this is trad climbing, crack climbing, not sport climbing with bolted routes, all of our weight is held in little bits wedged into tiny cracks in the rock. 

All of my logic is telling me not to do this, I know I can trust them, their judgment, and their gear but everything about hanging hundreds of feet up in the air against a vertical rock face that looks a million miles high as I stare up at it at a neck breaking angle, and then look back down and swallow my tongue to the pit in my stomach. I have my tip toes balanced on a hold the size of a nickel, I’m loosing my grip, my hands are starting to get sweaty and my forearms and fingers are staring to get weak, my legs are shaking, I can see the visitor center and the vehicles looking like a tiny dots off in the distance. I’m shitting my pants, I’m scared stiff I know I can trust that if I have to take a fall and can’t make a hold or a foot placemat, I know that the rope will save my if I fall yet mentally it was so hard to move past those blocks and barriers. I was trying really hard but this wasn’t necessarily a beginner friendly challenge for the novice rock climber, this is DEVILS FREAKING TOWER we’re talking about here folks, this is the real fucking deal people. World class climbers travel from far and wide all around the globe just to get a chance up this iconic thing. 

I moved past the fear and pushed myself harder mentally and physically up that wall than I did up most the mountains I had climbed at that point in time in my life on the bike. I had the fitness just not the skill set, my body was used to using certain muscle groups in certain ways. These other untrained ones had never been pushed like this. We muscle on.

Two pitches up and the weather started to shift and after having experienced an unpredictable pop up Wyoming hail storm the day before being pelted through the tree cover we did not want to risk being exposed to that kind of a system in that kind of position. This made for an even more interesting turn of events when time was of a factor to get back down. It truly was amazing to watch those guys work it was the most realistic emergency evacuation training of all time nothing like preparing for the real thing with the real thing, with a novice. 

I’ll never forget that day those guys or the wild series of events that brought me to that place in time. When we got back to the lodge I gave Frank a marble I had made that I that I had planned on placing at the top when we summited. I told him place it at the top for me and that way when I come back I’ll have to climb to the top to get it back. Blessed are those who live out their dreams.  I have two years on the road full of stories like these and I feel blessed everyday that I made the decision to take the leap of faith and go on this adventure. It is something I will carry with me for the rest of my life and look back on fondly forever.

I have marbles hidden all over the country that I made, sprinkled on the summits of mountains, a trail of bread crumbs made of pieces of myself forged in the fire for you to find on your next adventure. If a place left it’s mark on me I left my mark on it, as subtlety and discretely as possible for others to find and pass along. Ask me for clues on the other hides and I’ll be happy to drop you some hints, just don’t beat me to the summit of devils tower, that ones for me.